Bridge to Havana

Amazon.com

Some surprising cross-cultural collaborations are the main attraction of Bridge to Havana, which documents the 1999 journey by dozens of American and British musicians to Cuba, where they wrote, recorded, and performed songs with their island counterparts. While political rapprochement between the American and Cuban governments may still be a fantasy, there were no certainly no problems among the musicians; indeed, the process of creating new partnerships by literally drawing names out of a hat created some unexpectedly fruitful results. If, for example, putting Jimmy Buffett, Fleetwood Mac's Mick Fleetwood, the Chieftains' Paddy Moloney, Cuba's Augusto Enriquez, and various others in the studio and onstage together (for the song "One World") seems farfetched, for the most part it works. The performances on this hour-long disc come both from the studio (Gladys Knight with various Cubans, Peter Frampton with Alberto Tosca) and from the concert that concluded the trip (Joan Osborne, who did such great work in Standing in the Shadows of Motown, is excellent again here). Given the brief amount of time the musicians had to get acquainted and write material together, the songs they came up with can be a bit on the obvious side, but there's no denying the spirit at work throughout this interesting, entertaining program. --Sam Graham

Customer Reviews:

We need more ... .......2007-07-07

So many of us want to go to Cuba ~ for now the best we can do is
watch & listen to what others are able to produce.

Let's organize and get the sanctions lifted!

ms gladys knight stole the show!!.......2006-10-13

IF YOU ARE A GLADYS KNIGHT FAN THEN YOU BEST CHECK OUT THIS DVD AND CD BECAUSE GLADYS DOES SOMETHING TOTALLY DIFFERENT AND PULLS IT OFF. SHE SINGS A LATIN TYPE OF SONG CALLED FELLIN GOOD WITH A MALE SINGER BUT IT'S A SONG THAT MAKES YOU WANT TO SALSA DANCE TO AND IT'S A BEAUTIFUL SONG CO WRITTEN BY GLADYS TOO. GLADYS IF YOU OR HER DAUGHTER READS THIS I HOPE YOUR NEXT CD ON VERVE RECORDS YOU PUT THIS SONG ON IT AND MAYBE DO A WHOLE ALBUM AROUND LATIN MUSIC GIRL YOU CAN DO IT LIKE THE SONG GOES HEY!! ALSO CHECK OUT GLADYS BEFORE ME CD I SMELL GRAMMY ALL OVER IT AND YOU NEVER SOUNDED SO SWEET AND FINALLY YOU ARE GETTIN YOUR DUE. YOU NEED TO RECORD A DVD CONCERT FOR US FANS AND YOUR NEW FANS TOO YOUR COOKIN BABY GOD BLESS AND LOOK OUT NEW YORK IN 2007 HAVE THE TAPE PLAYER ROLLIN TO RECORD A LIVE CD AND FILM YOU LIVE AT THE BIG "C HALL " FOR A DVD LIVE CONCERT YOU HAVE COME ALONG WAY SINCE LEAVIN THE PIPS YOU GOT THE SONGS TO SUPPORT YOUR SOLO CAREER CALL DIONNE AND PATTI TO DROP BY SISTERS IN THE NAME OF LUV REMEMBER HBO I DO...SMILE DANN LUV YA!

Bridge to Havana.......2004-11-27

Although the dvd is excellent as far as it goes, as an owner of the cd, I was extremely disappointed that not all the performances were included. You advertise Bonnie Raitt in your headline, but her song is not included. This is very misleading - a Bonnie Raitt fan would be VERY disappointed! I would have expected at least all the songs on the cd plus some extras on the dvd.
I was left very unsatisfied, and will probably only listen to the cd in the future.

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